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The Maestro in Her Tails by Anne Lagamayo
Where are all the female conductors? Symphony orchestras in Europe and the US are dominated by men – except in Greenwich Village in New York City, where Barbara Yahr has been conducting the local orchestra for over a decade.
See transcript
Transcript :[Barbara Yahr]
My clearest memory was being at the piano and just making up stories. There was a princess at the top of the piano and a bad guy at the bottom and a knight would gallop through the keyboard. And I would just play and tell stories to myself.
I ended up studying music and I was really moved and really taken with the idea that I could communicate with musicians without talking. I was the only female conductor in my class. I may have been the first in that class.
I was ambitious, very ambitious, or I wouldn’t have gotten as far as I got, but if you also want to be there after school and your kid comes home and feels bad, it’s hard to pop on a plane and go conduct some big orchestra.
About 12 years ago, I was pregnant with my child and I was having lunch with a friend and he said, “Gee, I hear this orchestra downtown is looking for a conductor,” and I said, “Oh, really? I’m interested.”
The first rehearsal was just awful. The oboe could barely give an A. People weren’t showing up, there wasn’t enough structure and discipline about things. So once they gave me the position, I imposed a lot more power into my hands. I put some rules down that not everyone loved but over the years it’s really built the orchestra.
Conducting for me … you look on that podium it’s like a giant microscope. Whatever you are gets blown up way big. It’s different when a woman is up there than when a man is up there.
I think there are the sort of deep icons in our society. The Maestro, in his tails, in his wind-swept hair, that is one of our icons. Power in our culture is a manly thing.
I kind of sit back and chuckle a little bit. I think it is so silly. Of all the things in the world to be fussing about – there’s so many problems with the world – why worry if the conductor is a man or a woman?
My clearest memory was being at the piano and just making up stories. There was a princess at the top of the piano and a bad guy at the bottom and a knight would gallop through the keyboard. And I would just play and tell stories to myself.
I ended up studying music and I was really moved and really taken with the idea that I could communicate with musicians without talking. I was the only female conductor in my class. I may have been the first in that class.
I was ambitious, very ambitious, or I wouldn’t have gotten as far as I got, but if you also want to be there after school and your kid comes home and feels bad, it’s hard to pop on a plane and go conduct some big orchestra.
About 12 years ago, I was pregnant with my child and I was having lunch with a friend and he said, “Gee, I hear this orchestra downtown is looking for a conductor,” and I said, “Oh, really? I’m interested.”
The first rehearsal was just awful. The oboe could barely give an A. People weren’t showing up, there wasn’t enough structure and discipline about things. So once they gave me the position, I imposed a lot more power into my hands. I put some rules down that not everyone loved but over the years it’s really built the orchestra.
Conducting for me … you look on that podium it’s like a giant microscope. Whatever you are gets blown up way big. It’s different when a woman is up there than when a man is up there.
I think there are the sort of deep icons in our society. The Maestro, in his tails, in his wind-swept hair, that is one of our icons. Power in our culture is a manly thing.
I kind of sit back and chuckle a little bit. I think it is so silly. Of all the things in the world to be fussing about – there’s so many problems with the world – why worry if the conductor is a man or a woman?
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more info:“The essence of the conductor’s profession is strength. The essence of a woman is weakness,” said Russian maestro Yuri Temirkanov in a New Yorker article in October 2013. The quote brought out an outcry against sexism in classical music and people started asking – where are all the female orchestra conductors? Of the 103 orchestras in the United States, only 12 are conducted by women. Of the 22 major high-budget American orchestras, only the world-renowned Marin Alsop conducts one, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.
Barbara Yahr, has been the conductor of the Greenwich Village Orchestra for 12 years, long before anyone started noticing the lack of women conductors. As the only woman in her conducting class at the Curtis Institute of Music, she led a successful musical career – she has travelled and guest conducted a number of professional orchestras from Israel to Japan. Now, she is also a mother of an 11-year-old boy, a music therapist who works with children, and the maestro of the well-loved Greenwich Village Orchestra. In that part of town, at least, there was never a question of whether a woman can lead an orchestra – the iconic image of the maestro in her tails has always been Yahr.
Barbara Yahr, has been the conductor of the Greenwich Village Orchestra for 12 years, long before anyone started noticing the lack of women conductors. As the only woman in her conducting class at the Curtis Institute of Music, she led a successful musical career – she has travelled and guest conducted a number of professional orchestras from Israel to Japan. Now, she is also a mother of an 11-year-old boy, a music therapist who works with children, and the maestro of the well-loved Greenwich Village Orchestra. In that part of town, at least, there was never a question of whether a woman can lead an orchestra – the iconic image of the maestro in her tails has always been Yahr.